I can’t find an on-line link, but there is an ad for the film in the Weekend Arts section of the New York Times. There is a quote from Mel Gibson that reveals his real reason for “recutting” the film is so that by “softening some of its more wrenching aspects . . . my film and its message of love” can be made available to more people.
Personally, I don’t see where the love comes in when you’re whipping and punching and torturing a man. Nor am I able to find any message of love from a son, who is getting his ass handed to him (almost literally), knowing that his mother is watching and suffering like no mother should, decides that the best thing to do when the masochistic soldiers have stopped mincing his hide, is to get up again, taunting them to do more!!
Well, the soldiers seemed to love kicking Christ’s backside up and down the road to Golgotha. Maybe that’s the love Mel is talking about.